Grain farmers are known for their generosity when supplying nitrogen to the corn crop, but many growers get stingy when providing nitrogen to the soybean crop. That’s a situation University of Illinois plant physiology professor Fred Below sees too often when it comes to managing the oilseed crop. In his presentation last month at the Ontario Agricultural Conference, Below… Read More
The practice of variable rate seeding for corn continues to increase as growers attempt to match seeding rates and hybrid characteristics to the varying yield potential across their fields. With the growth of precision agriculture, every year more growers adopt variable rate seeding strategies but are they effectively evaluating and fine-tuning this strategy on their… Read More
When it comes to increasing soybean yield, University of Illinois plant physiology professor Fred Below has two words of advice — plant early. In his presentation earlier this month at the Ontario Agricultural Conference, Below shared data from eight years of trials that show growers in Illinois lose almost half a bushel (0.47 bu/ac) for every day… Read More
In 2020, Eric Watson broke his own world record when he harvested 258 bushels of wheat per acre on his Ashburton, New Zealand farm. It’s an astounding yield that Canadian farmers can only dream about. But are there crop management tips that farmers in this country can glean from Watson’s record-setting wheat? Bayer CropScience regional business… Read More
We know that phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) are needed in soybeans to achieve those high yields. But what’s the right soil test level of each of these macronutrients, what happens when there’s too much or too little, and how does that level affect soybean yield? To answer these questions, RealAg’s Bernard Tobin is joined… Read More
It’s been more than 30 years since Caterpillar launched the first tracked tractor for farming. A lot has changed since those first basic tracks and under carriages rolled into farm fields. Most of those early tractors were in the 200 to 400 horsepower range. In the past decade however, many of those smaller tractors are… Read More
What’s the secret to growing those gigantic corn yields that turn a select few U.S. farmers into corn yield contest kings? Purdue University corn guru Dr. Bob Nielsen has been pouring over National Corn Yield Contest data and crop input and management summaries from winners for almost two decades. What has he learned? After all… Read More
We cover a lot of different agronomy topics here on RealAgriculture, but one area that doesn’t get attention all the time is cover crops. Anne Verhallen, soil specialist at OMAFRA, joins Bernard Tobin to discuss her recent presentation at Ontario Agriculture Conference, and why cover crop agronomy isn’t talked about all that often. “I think… Read More
The topic of soil health has gained a tremendous amount of followers over the last ten years. There’s a large, dynamic community devoted to the topic, too — from farmers and researchers, to consultants and extension specialists. Dr. Abbey Wick, extension soil health specialist and associate professor at North Dakota State University (NDSU), recently presented… Read More
Tillage destroys soil structure, cuts organic matter and decreases soil water infiltration. If that’s the case, reducing tillage makes sense, right? But the decision is not that simple, says Jodi DeJong-Hughes, University of Minnesota soil and tillage extension specialist. In her presentation at the virtual Ontario Agricultural Conference, DeJong-Hughes notes that there’s no hard and fast… Read More
The pandemic has affected the global economy in a broad sense, and there’s a lot of ground to recover from 2020. To help us get a sense of where 2021 is heading in terms of agricultural economics, Bernard Tobin is joined by Craig Klemmer, principle agricultural economist at Farm Credit Canada, who recently presented at… Read More
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